The Worst Panic Attack in History...

by Hannahbal
(Nottingham)

...was my first panic attack. I was on a train home from a weekend visiting my friend in Liverpool. I was going back to uni where I was miserable and had no friends. I was sitting down and suddenly became aware of a strange feeling rushing through my body, my hands felt like prickly rubber gloves, I stared at them but didn't recognise them. My breath became laboured and I stood up, feeling a rush through my whole body, as my brain ran at a thousand miles an hour. Pure fear coursed through me. Luckily the train had pulled into a station (St Helens, a place I had never been to and knew nothing about.) I staggered off the train, my breathing ragged and my whole body on fire with a strange prickling, my hands were shaking and it felt as though beetles were crawling under my skin across my whole body. I thought I was about to die. I walked out into the street and there was a man in a hi-vis jacket, I think some kind of workman, and I approached him and managed to say "Where's the nearest hospital?" By some incredible stroke of luck, there was a walk-in centre just across the car park. After I got in I walked up and down, unable to sit down or speak as the panic attack coursed through my body. My lips were set in a strange grimace. My mind was out of touch with my body, it went zooming up into space and tears rolled down my cheeks. My hands had somehow siezed into claws, I was unable to move them properly, they were like lobsters hands. I know now this was the adrenaline. I stammered to the lady at the desk that I thought I had taken a drug overdose (MDMA and cocaine had been consumed that weekend, along with Fluoxetine for my depression. I hope I don't lose your sympathy for having taken drugs, I had no idea it would have caused me to have this horrible experience, and I haven't touched them since.) They took me in an ambulance to the hospital nearby and did an ECG which was fine, and after a few hours I was allowed to go. I felt drained, spaced out and incredibly low afterwards. The whole thing spanned about 3 hours. It was the worst experience of my life.

Comments for The Worst Panic Attack in History...

I thought I was overdosing on cocaine. (Which i consumed alot of all day before) Also many other drugs those past weeks & a plan B I was also very hungover. A week before this I fell and hit my head from 8 feet on a bathtub and got a concussion head injury so I didnt know if that was the problem. Im only 17 So i had no idea what was going on with me. I was just laying in my parents bed when suddenly I felt numbness in my legs which came back every 3 seconds to the point where i felt like i wasnt laying in the bed (I have had a heart problem since I was little to where I have never gotten checked out) so right after I felt 3 sharp pains in my heart and chest like that feeling where your hearts dropping. I got up *falling over* and ran downstairs where my aunt and mom were, my moms dying sick so at the time she was throwing up so that made me even more scared. I tried holding on to the counter but fell over. I screamed mom call someone call 911 this isnt right not even making sense my aunt was frieghtened she felt my heart beat it was beating 117 out of my chest when I swallowed I could feel popping noises in my ear like I was drounding I thought that was internal bleeding from the fall. she started crying my whole body was number I had no clue what was going on. I felt scared and alone squeezing my aunts hand like no one could help me, like I was gonna die before the ambulance got there. I was crying Shaking couldnt even sit in my chair. The ambulance got there finally showed up at the hospital and had to stay at the hospital all night getting tests done on me and my attack was still going on. Im getting heart surgery and had THE WORST full-blown panic attack that the paramedics and docter has ever seen. Plus heart problems. Horrible feeling